Circular Buffer for Video Jitter and Latency Reduction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Digital video streams experience jitter and latency due to packet loss and bandwidth variations during transmission, which existing technologies fail to adequately address, leading to errors and delays in decoding and rendering.
Innovation Solution
A system that combines a circular buffer with a packet jitter buffer to store and decode video packets, allowing immediate decoding and rendering of frames once all necessary packets are received, and employs forward error correction to reconstruct missing packets, thereby reducing jitter and latency.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If packets are transmitted over a network with bandwidth variations and loss, then video transmission can reach more devices, but jitter and latency increase causing decoding errors
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by storing video packets in a circular buffer before decoding occurs. This allows the system to accumulate packets and wait for complete frames even when network transmission is delayed or packets are lost, ensuring that decoding only happens when all necessary packets are available, thus maintaining decoding accuracy despite network variability
Solution Approach 2:
The circular buffer acts as a cushioning mechanism that absorbs network jitter and packet loss variations. By having a buffer capacity to hold multiple packets, the system can withstand temporary transmission failures or delays without causing decoding errors, providing a safety margin against network unreliability
2Reliability
If packets are stored in a buffer to reduce jitter, then decoding accuracy improves, but latency increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamics by making the buffer operation adaptive rather than static. The circular buffer dynamically adjusts its behavior based on packet arrival patterns and decoding requirements. Packets are stored only until their corresponding frame is complete, then immediately decoded and displayed, preventing unnecessary latency accumulation while still providing jitter reduction when needed
Solution Approach 2:
The system maintains continuity of useful action by ensuring that as soon as all packets for a frame are received in the circular buffer, decoding and rendering proceed immediately without artificial delays. This continuous flow minimizes latency while the buffer continues to operate in the background to handle jitter, ensuring that video playback progresses smoothly without unnecessary waiting time
3Stability of the object's composition
If traditional jitter buffers are used, then packet latency variation is reduced, but retransmission is still required for lost packets
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the jitter buffer functionality with the frame buffer into a single circular buffer structure. This combination eliminates the need for separate jitter buffer and retransmission mechanisms, as the circular buffer naturally handles both jitter reduction and packet loss recovery by waiting for complete frames before decoding, simplifying the overall system architecture while maintaining stability
Data Source
AI summary
Systems, apparatuses and methods for decoding and encoding a video stream having a plurality of frames using a ring (circular) buffer are disclosed. When decoding, a decoder can receive packets from an encoder and store them in a circular buffer. The circular buffer can store packets until packets comprising complete frames are received. Storing multiple partial or complete frames in a circular buffer removes jitter and permits forward error correction to proceed by efficiently assembling complete frames and minimizing delay.